Children's health and illness behaviour: the single working mother's perspective

This study explored how single working mothers perceive and deal with concerns about their children's health. "Grounded theory" analysis of data from interviews with single mothers in a wide variety of circumstances suggested that contextual factors including the mother's work situation, child care and social network are important to understanding the health and illness behaviour of these families. Children's use of health services appeared to reflect the single mother's attempts to manage her roles as mother (nurturer) and worker (provider), and her sense of role flexibility. A sense of flexibility appeared to mitigate role conflict and to interact with other known influences of health services utilization including the quality of the client/practitioner relationship. The mother's sense of flexibility appeared to vary with her income, child care arrangement, work situation (e.g., emphathetic supervisor), access to tangible support (e.g., child care) and social network (i.e., proximity to her family of origin).